I hesitated about jumping in this post as charcoal seems to be sort of like religion to some people, but here goes anyway. I am one of the few eggheads that really prefers BGE lump. I know... I know... I have heard all the "its made at the same place" and "you are just wasting money" arguments, but I think it is different. It seems to be much better quality and the burn times are longer for me. For me, your mileage may very.

I hesitated about jumping in this post as charcoal seems to be sort of like religion to some people, but here goes anyway. I am one of the few eggheads that really prefers BGE lump. I know... I know... I have heard all the "its made at the same place" and "you are just wasting money" arguments, but I think it is different. It seems to be much better quality and the burn times are longer for me. For me, your mileage may very.

Lump at a minimum, but BGE is my first choice.

I'm in agreement, I don't think it's all the same. I have noticed a big difference in the couple brands I use. BGE is a good bag of Lump! Good consistence on the few bags I ran through. Have a big bag ready to burn sitting in the garage.

I hesitated about jumping in this post as charcoal seems to be sort of like religion to some people, but here goes anyway. I am one of the few eggheads that really prefers BGE lump. I know... I know... I have heard all the "its made at the same place" and "you are just wasting money" arguments, but I think it is different. It seems to be much better quality and the burn times are longer for me. For me, your mileage may very.

Lump at a minimum, but BGE is my first choice.

I'm in agreement, I don't think it's all the same. I have noticed a big difference in the couple brands I use. BGE is a good bag of Lump! Good consistence on the few bags I ran through. Have a big bag ready to burn sitting in the garage.

I'm a fan of Royal Oak lump. I've heard its made by the same people that make BGE lump and Kroger brand lump, just a different brand. I liked Kroger, but don't shop there anymore and have never tried BGE to compare. I also like B&B.

When I had my now retired CG Smoking Pro, I used to use only all natural hardwood briquettes. I used Duraflame, Wicked Good, Weber Competition Blend, and Stubbs. I liked all of those although the Weber was my last choice because it had borax in it and I had mixed feelings about that. All-natural hardwood briquettes had most of the advantages of lump charcoal, without the irregular and varying shapes and sizes. The uniformly sized briquettes used to run very steady in my CG. The problem was getting any charcoal other than blue bag Kingsford in Winter here in New England. Each of the charcoal listed above, with the exception of the Stubbs, would be sold around here for a couple years and all of a sudden the stores weren't carrying it anymore. The Stubbs was carried by Lowes, and I noticed last winter they seem to be running out of it too.

Fortunately for me, I use lump in the egg. For whatever reason lump is available all year around here. My lump of choice is Wicked Good Weekend Warrior. It is a little pricier than many brands But the bags usually have nice large chunks and the smoke is very neutral. I like this because I bake in my Egg and I don't want smoke flavored breads and pastries. I appreciate the ability to add my own smoke flavor via wood chunks and chips when and if I need it. If you can't find WGWW in your area, check with your local Ace Hardware. Many of them have a program where they will get WGWW delivered to the store in about two days at no additional cost to you.